Reinout van den Bergh (The Netherlands, 1957) studied photography and audio-visual design at the Academy of Art and Design Sint Joost, in Breda, The Netherlands. He has been working as a freelance photographer since the early 1980s.
In addition, he took on assignments commissioned by both public and private organisations, such as the Royal Tropical Institute in Amsterdam and the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
In his work, Van den Bergh focuses on people’s everyday lives: how they live, eat, drink, work, sleep, dream and love. He made numerous books, among which ‘Living Apart Together’ (1997) on the cultural similarities and differences between Bhutan, Costa Rica, Benin and The Netherlands. ‘The Miners From Beringen’ (2014) was named one of the best photo books of the year by Dutch daily de Volkskrant. It was a collection of pictures he made in Beringen, a Belgian mining community, in the 1980s.
For his long-term ‘Factories’ project, he and artist Huib Fens visited industrial heritage all over Europe. His ‘Environment’ project was a combination of visual art and photography, for which he cooperated with the sculptor Gerhard Lentink and travelled to various European countries.
Van den Bergh is a curator for BredaPhoto international photo festival since 2006. In 2010 he started on his project Eboundja, an in-depth visual study of a tiny coastal village in Africa that witnesses fundamental changes due to the construction of a nearby deep-sea harbour.
The Eriskay Connection